Reason Bites Back

"Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things . . . that takes religion."--Stephen Weinberg, Nobel LaureateThe above quote was repeated by Richard Dawkins in his hard-hitting 2-part UK Channel 4 documentary series The Root of All Evil. The Root in question is religion. "Darwin's Rottweiler," as the promo referred to Dawkins, came out full throttle to argue that religion is not only "barking mad" but dangerous to boot. Focusing on Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Dawkins doled out insults without restraint, referring to a parade of Catholic pilgrims en route to Lourdes as a "benign herd" and defining faith as "a process of non-thinking." His interviews with priests, rabbis, mullas, and preachers were brittle with barely contained rage at their unwillingness to acknowledge the utter lack of evidence for their creationist nonsense.Dawkins is one of my heroes. Ever since the death of Carl Sagan, I have longed for a philosopher scientist to put forward the rationalist argument for the sake of positive political and social change. With this series, Dawkins announces himself as Sagan's heir.Such a venomous display of anti-religiosity will not dissuade the faithful, mind you. They will find Dawkins arrogant, cold, and condescending. Despite his last minute plea that atheism is actually "life-affirming," no devout Catholics, Jews, Christians, or Muslims will be picking up The Origin of Species because of him.But.It warmed my heart to see this righteous and much needed polemic in prime time on a major TV channel. It signals a readiness to explore the dark side of superstitious claptrap. And this is a dark side that very much needs exploring. A lie is a lie no matter how old it is. And when you prepare children to accept as truth the heaping bucketfulls of patently obvious lies religion ladles out, you prepare their minds to accept all manner of lies. The day The Root of All Evil airs on American television is the day we begin to step from the self-imposed darkness of religious delusion into the light of reason.